How a teacher spends Halloween

The following is a true story. Names have been changed to protect the guilty.

It was a dark Halloween night. October 31, 2008 around 10:45 pm. All Halloween candy has been given out. Friends of the Osborn's, Mr. and Mrs. Largent, have just left after a night with friends and a scary movie.

Mr. Osborn is in the living room, and hears a jiggling of the front door handle. He pauses the television to make sure he is not just hearing something. Then, he looks through the curtains, and spots two teenagers on the front lawn. Thinking that they are just late trick-or-treaters, Mr. Osborn turns off the porch light. For a second time, he looks out the window to see if anyone is there, only to see the same teenage kids throwing something on the driveway. Reminiscing on his own teenage years, Mr. Osborn knows exactly what is happening: he and Mrs. Osborn are being pranked. Quickly, he throws his shoes on and runs out the front door. He looks across the street to see some kids running toward a truck down the road and knows they are the pranksters. He runs toward the same truck, slaps the hood of the car, and tells the boys to stop the vehicle. Mr. Osborn steps in front of the truck, and tells the boys that they have some cleanup to do. After a brief stare down, the three terrified boys turn the engine off and follow Mr. Osborn back to the house. Mr. Osborn goes to the garage to get a hose, while the boys go around to the side of the house to get a trashcan.

Meanwhile, Mrs. Osborn is working in the computer room, oblivious to what is going on outside. She notices the house is a little too quiet, and goes to the front window to look outside after she cannot find her husband. She calls to Mr. Osborn outside, and he tells her not to worry, that everything is fine. But Mrs. Osborn sees the blood in the driveway, the tampons at the doorstep, and the peanut butter on the doorknob. She grows angry, and also realizes that a prank has been pulled. Mrs. Osborn runs to the side yard where the teenagers are pulling out the trashcan. She begins to explain to the boys in a very harsh tone that they are lucky she is not calling the police.

“Where are your parents?” she asks. “Do they know what you are doing tonight? Do you know that I am a schoolteacher? You really chose the wrong house,” she says. Every question is answered by teen boy #1 with a fearful “Yes, Ma’am,” or “No, Ma’am.” She goes on to ask the first boy she sees for his name and his parents phone number. She calls the boys parents. Lucky for him, they are not home. “Okay, kid, you’re next,” she says to teen boy #2, ready to call his parents. As she sees his face along with teen boy #3, Mrs. Osborn realizes both are students in her 2nd hour Art class. She is equally surprised and amused by this realization. Mrs. Osborn begins to laugh. “'Bob', 'Joe', did you really not have anything better to do than to drive all the way to Owasso to prank me?” she laughs. Mrs. Osborn goes inside to get her camera to document the boys’ presence at her house, should she need evidence. It turns out that teen boy #1 will be in her class next term. Not such a good choice for a first impression. (There were also plans to place a dead skunk in the yard, which thankfully never came to fruition after being prematurely caught)

After cleaning everything up, Mr. Osborn tells the still scared and now embarrassed boys that they may go home now. Mr. and Mrs. Osborn have a good laugh, and are so delighted that Mr. Osborn caught the boys in the act. I guess you could say they had the last laugh.

Moral of the story: Don’t mess with Mrs. Osborn, or you’ll have Mr. Osborn chasing you down!